Indeed, it's a bit puzzling. In Hong Kong, people could freely choose between Sinovac and Comirnaty ("Pfizer" for most in the West, but "Fosun-BioNTech" to tho

Indeed, it's a bit puzzling. In Hong Kong, people could freely choose between Sinovac and Comirnaty ("Pfizer" for most in the West, but "Fosun-BioNTech" to those in Hong Kong), both were widely available during the main vaccination drive. Roughly half choose Sinovac, anecdotally due to scare stories on social media at the time about the "experimental, unproven" mRNA tech vs the "traditional, tried and tested" inactivated virus tech of Sinovac. The biggest COVID problem in Hong Kong (and also to a large extend in China) I gather is that the vaccination rate among the elderly was the lowest, which is a reversal from most other countries. That creates huge problems for hospitals, as the elderly are massively over-represented in COVID hospitalisations. It's not completely known why the elderly vaccination rate is relatively low, but I suspect misinformation and conspiracy stories (which proliferate just as much on the Chinese social media platforms as here on Facebook) is a significant contributor.